Wednesday, July 7, 2004 | 9:11 a.m.
WASHINGTON -- Sen. John Edwards, presumptive Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry's pick for vice president, has voted against positions taken by Nevada officials on two of the biggest state issues considered by U.S. lawmakers.
Edwards, D-N.C., supported the Energy Department's Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage project and an effort to ban betting on college sports in Nevada.
Edwards co-sponsored the 2001 bill that would have outlawed betting on college sports in Nevada, a measure stridently opposed by Nevada officials, the state's federal lawmakers and top casino industry executives.
He voted against an amendment offered by Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., during a Senate Commerce Committee markup of the bill that would have stripped the ban, according to congressional records.
"I think it is very important for us to send a clear and unmistakable signal that we do not condone gambling on college sports," Edwards said, according to a May 2001 press release.
Ensign's amendment failed on with 10-10 vote in the committee. Committee members Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, and Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., who is now the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, did not vote on the amendment. An amendment needs to win a vote to pass. A final Senate vote on the bill never occurred.
It is not known if his position on the betting ban has changed, according to Edwards' office.
Frank Fahrenkopf, president of the American Gaming Association, said his organization does not take sides in presidential races, but acknowledged that this is one local issue that could impact how people in Nevada vote in November.
"I don't think it will be an issue other than in Nevada," Fahrenkopf said. "If he becomes vice president, I don't think this is something that's going to be on his agenda to push."
Fahrenkopf said he was not sure if voters would not choose the Kerry-Edwards tickets based on that one issue. He said the betting ban is the only time Edwards has spoken out on gaming issue.
Also, Edwards voted in July 2002 to allow the Yucca Mountain project to proceed.
Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he has spoken with Edwards and Edwards now agrees with Kerry's opposition to the project. North Carolina has five nuclear reactors. Since 1983, ratepayers have put just over $1 billion into the Nuclear Waste Fund, a federal account set aside to fund the Yucca Mountain project. The account has about $14 billion in it but Congress continues to give less money to the project than the department requests.
Massachusetts only has one nuclear reactor and ratepayers have put $213.7 million into the fund since 1983, when it was created.
Edwards co-sponsored a bill in November 2002 aimed at making nuclear waste shipments to Yucca safer.
"We need a secure and central place to permanently store the nation's growing and scattered stockpile of nuclear waste, but we also need to make sure we ship the waste in the safest way possible," Edwards said, according to a press 2002 press release.
His release says "Yucca Mountain will offer a safe, central repository for the estimated 77,000 tons of nuclear material expected to be shipped to Nevada during the two decades after the national disposal site opens."
The bill would have set aside $6 million in 2003 to improve transportation routes and to train state and local emergency workers to respond in the event of accidents, among other provision, but it did not move anywhere.
Nuclear industry sources say Edwards has not been vocal for or against nuclear power or the Yucca project. If elected, his opposition to the project he now shares with Kerry could be just that he would support the president's policy, sources said.
Nevadans donated $83,654 to Edwards during his campaign for president, with $44,906 coming from Las Vegas, mainly from law firms, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a group that collects campaign finance data.
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